


Broken Skies

by MechanicalDetective (deducemypain)



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-27
Updated: 2013-10-27
Packaged: 2017-12-30 15:40:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1020429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deducemypain/pseuds/MechanicalDetective
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>That day.<br/>I don't want to relive it.<br/>But I do.<br/>Over and over and over again.</p>
<p>Reichenbach.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Broken Skies

**Author's Note:**

> So, guys, this is my first fanfic. I actually wrote this a while ago, finished it a while ago, and never got around to publishing it.  
> So, have fun reading it. Tissue warning, maybe.  
> If you want to translate it (really? It's not that good...), go ahead.  
> Enjoy.

_Broken Skies_

 

 

_No one can fill up that space beside me,_

_No one can stitch up my shattered heart,_

_No one can try to mend my sorrows,_

_Fix me up and put me back together again._

_I’m a broken work of art,_

_Shattered and cracked beyond repair,_

_No matter what hands shape me back together,_

_The cracks and damage are still there._

_***  
_

 

 

 

The sky was the color of murky tears. Of gloominess and sadness, of predictions of rain and thunder, of liquid sadness falling from the sky. It was this sky that remains frozen in my memory, this sky that bears my friend’s black silhouette like a ragged scar upon white silk. A last tribute to the greatest man that ever lived.

 

 

***

 

 

“Goodbye, John.” And with that, his voice was gone. Cut off. Ended by the empty emotionless tone of my cell phone.

As I round the corner, I see him, the tall, thin black figure with his familiar black coat, perched atop St. Bartholomew’s rooftop, his arms spread wide. If I look carefully, his face doesn’t look scared or frightened. His expression is one of calm, of tranquility, of silent acceptance, but a shade of regret flickers across his features when he sees me... I don’t like it. This mute acceptor of a fate he does not deserve... it is not my friend. Sherlock is spirited, the voice of revolution itself. This simply cannot be him.

“Sherlock! No! Stop!” I watch as my feet carry me forward across the lot, run as though maybe, just maybe I could reach him, stop him.

”Stop! Sherlock!” I dimly hear someone howl his name... is it me? Am I the one yelling, screaming, the one who sounds like he’s being tortured? Is this really my voice? My breath rushes in and out of my lungs, and my blood pounds away in my ears, nearly blocking out all other sounds.

The moment he tips forward, everything else stops. Everything but him.

Slowly, almost as if he has all the time in the world, he leans forward, arms still stretched out wide in the midst of flight, tapered and strong and sharp. His eyes dart to meet mine one last time before he takes to the air completely. For a short moment that’s stretched into an eternity, he seems to really be flying, as though the laws of gravity no longer apply to him. For a second, he is free, and the worried expression floats off his face, leaving serenity in his eyes.

And reality sets in, and his arms flail as though wings were suddenly replaced by clumsy human limbs. His great black overcoat swoops up behind him like a cape, and he drops towards the sidewalk. My arm’s still stretched out towards him, my hand as though it’s reaching out to grab something, when he hits the ground.

I stumble forward clumsily, my hand still outstretched, the pain in my leg back and debilitating as ever. “No, Sherlock, Sherlock, Sherlock, SHERLOCK!” My breath explodes out of my lungs, my mind silently mutters it, screams it, chants and howls it like a desperate wish that all of this will have been a dream, that I’ll wake up in my bed at 221B Baker Street, that Sherlock’s reasonably well and alive and maybe even sleeping quietly in his room. Hell, I’d even be happy to get up and make breakfast and do the dishes and every single mundane task in the world, if only this were just a dream. Just a nightmare and nothing more.

It’s only when something crashes into me, and my head slams onto the cold concrete that this delicate mirage of tranquility shatters. Everything shatters into tiny shards of broken glass-like memories. I watch the man ride off on his bicycle, and the world explodes into a kaleidoscope of broken bits of details and blood and memories.

My feet rush to his side, my unfeeling fingers reach for a pulse that I know won’t be there. I hope, and I hope that I’m wrong. They drag me away, and I hear myself scream that I’m a doctor, and the hands yield, draw away from me, and then it’s just me and Sherlock.

The beautiful yet cold icy blue eyes are trapped open in a glassy open stare. I can see my reflection in them, a face with a shock of tawny hair and a horrid empty stare of incomprehension, and the sky, the gray, gloomy, murky, salty tear-filled sky.

I wait, hoping to see his eyes blink and narrow and his lips and voice to tell me that I’m an idiot, except, of course, they won’t.

And the blood. There is so much blood, and my hands rush everywhere, into his curly dark hair, his temple, his mouth, his nose, his forehead, just rushing to wipe away all the blood, the crimson that stains everything and runs across the startling blue icy irises. I wipe away the blood, and I shake him slightly, even though you should never shake a wounded person.

“Sherlock,” I say, leaning close as though checking for breath. “Sherlock! Please, get up! Just get up, you bloody idiot! You bastard, don’t leave me here!”

Hands drag me away as the whining sirens of the ambulance draw closer. They screech at my eardrums, and paramedics rush out, clad in white, checking his pulse like I did. They pick my friend up, strap his still body to a gurney, and to my horror, slide his eyes shut and cover his staring face from my view, pulling the white sheet above his head. One of them shakes his head at me, the eyes above the white mask blinking sadly.

For a second, I am angry. I want to scream. _Who do you want to scream at?_ a small voice questions me, the last remnant of sanity.

I want to scream at Moriarty, the one who planned all of this. I want to scream at fate, for getting me shot and sent home from the desert hell that is Afghanistan. I want to scream at Mycroft, for not being here when we most need him to protect his younger brother, who, contrary to his opinion, absolutely needs watching over. I want to scream at Sherlock, for not being the one who has to cut off his other half and feel missing for the rest of his life. But most of all, I want to scream at myself. Everyone trusted me with Sherlock, to keep the great genius safe from others and safe from himself. I failed them all, especially Sherlock. I’ve failed all of them, failed in the one task that I was given, the most valuable task of all.

He wasn’t just a human life. He was a friend. My best friend. The one that I can never replace.

_I’ve failed you, Sherlock. I’m so sorry._

_***  
_

 

 

I kneel before his gravestone. Another cloudy and rainy day, so much like the one that’s forever carved into my memory.

It’s polished, shiny obsidian black, and the golden letters of his name are carved perfectly into the stone. It’s magnificent, almost a fitting tribute to the world’s first and greatest consulting detective. Almost a fitting tribute. _Almost_. Nothing fits Sherlock.

He was more than the world’s only consulting detective. He was a flatmate. A genius. But most of all, a friend. No, he wasn’t just a friend, not even just a best friend. We were something more. We were... we were... what were we? I rack my brain for an answer.

_Us_. We were us.

And I’ll miss every single part of him that was us. His bright blue eyes like the depths of glaciers, cold and harboring secrets that have yet to be revealed.

His silky, almost-black locks of hair, and the pale, slender hands that were almost always beneath his chin, the fingertips that lined up one by one and rested on his lips.

I’ll miss his voice, the one that was filled with warm praise on the rare occasions when I could follow his thoughts, the one that accompanied the rolling of those eyes and a soft “Idiot!” or “Stupid!”

I’ll stand looking at our flat’s wallpaper, tracing over the bullet holes over and over again, trying to remember and echo every little thing he ever touched. But it’s impossible, because he inspired and swayed everyone and everything he ever saw and met, regardless of how they knew him or what he did. And me. Sherlock turned my world right side up. I’ll never forget him until I’ve disappeared from this world.

I open my mouth to speak, not knowing what to say. What should I say? What do I say to the most noble man I’ve ever known? What do I say to the man who insisted that heroes don't exist but saved my life and so many countless others?

And somehow, I know what to say. The words’ll turn out right, somehow, but nothing else will. Everything’s still shattered, and it’ll stay like that until I follow him to wherever we go after life.

And all my words, it all comes spilling out.

“You were the best man, the most human human being that I’ve ever known, and no one will ever convince me that you told me a lie. So there. I was so alone and I owe you so much.” The words run out of my mouth, flowing like an endless stream before I even know what they mean. My voice grows hoarse, choked up, but I don’t clear it. I don’t have enough strength to do anything but give Sherlock my final message, my final goodbye.

“Please, Sherlock. Please don’t be dead.”

I lift my head and I stare at my reflection in the black stone. I can’t stop it now, it’s too late. The hot tears seep out of my eyes, burning and stinging, and I wipe them away. He wouldn’t have wanted this.

“There’s just one more thing, one more miracle.

“Sherlock, for me. Don’t. Be...”

I take a gasp of air, sounding like a drowning man in the middle of the ocean, trapped and stranded to an inevitable fate.

“Dead.” My voice cracks, and I don’t want to finish, don’t want him to see me in this state. I have this odd thought that he wouldn’t know what to do. For all his brilliance and all his genius, he wouldn’t know how to stop my tears. So I wipe my tears myself, because I have to continue, have to ask this one last miracle.

For me. For him. For _us_.

“Would you do that just for me? Just stop it. Stop _this_.”


End file.
